My youngest granddaughter, Claire, isn’t quite two. The other morning she woke up and ran into her parents bedroom. She touched her dad’s bare toes and said, “Yuk.”

She ran out of the room, into her bedroom, opened a drawer, pulled out a few pair of socks and ran back to her dad. She covered each of his toes with a pair of her socks.

She hadn’t said YUCK about her dad’s cold toes. She’d said SOCKS.

She’s learning how to put words and sentences together. We don’t always know what she’s trying to say, so we often interpret her incorrectly, but when we do, she lets us know. She gets frustrated when we don’t understand her. She repeats the word, but it doesn’t help because it doesn’t sound like anything we’re familiar with.

Listening is a skill that many people haven’t mastered. Myself included. When people are talking to me, I’m often thinking about hijacking the conversation to add what I want to say. Instead, I should be focusing on what they’re saying.

So how can we try to show that we’re listening?

We might say, “That’s interesting. Tell me more.”

Or we ask good questions. It helps clarify meaning.

When Claire is trying to help us understand what she needs, we’ll say, “Is this what you want?” And we’ll point to something. We’ll work to clarify her meaning.

Many times she says, “No!”

We’ll ask more questions. “Are you saying MILK?” Or we’ll say, “Show Me.” Then she’ll run off and bring something back that illustrates her needs.

Listening takes practice, but the rewards are worth the effort. Yes, listening helps the person talking to you, but listening will also help build a closer relationship between you and your children. When you listen, you’re saying, “You matter. I value you.”

If we show our children how much we care by asking them questions in a non-threatening way, they’ll tell us so much more.

Children are known for throwing parents into heated power struggles. They don’t want to get dressed in the morning. They don’t want to eat their vegetables. They seem to sabotage schedules. First, it’s important for parents to know why power struggles happen. What causes them? Check out this post from Deb at Positive Parenting.

What can parents do?

Spend ten minutes a day one-on-one with her or him and LISTEN. This might sound simple, but when we get busy, we take for granted that our child knows we love him, and we think that’s enough, but often it isn’t. Taking a deliberate step toward focusing on your child and LISTENING can help turn things around on the front end.

Here’s how:

Be Intentional. Make an intentional HABIT of spending time with your child. If you do it at the same time every day you’ll have more success with making it a habit. Warning: Don’t do it only when the child is acting out. Spend time with them before their behavior takes a turn for the worse.

Give undivided attention. During your one-on-one time, stop multi-tasking and face your child like he or she is a colleague or friend. Give him your undivided attention. Don’t look at your phone, your computer, the meal you’re preparing, or your calendar.

Validate his interests. Say things like, “Tell me more. What happened next. What did you say? How does that work?” Let your child teach you something. Play dumb even if you know the answer.

Be present. Listen to what he’s not saying. Don’t share your opinion or think about what you’re going to say next. Show the child that you’re genuinely interested in what he has to say.

Compliment the good. Notice positive behavior and mention that you’re aware of it, that you’re proud of the child’s effort.

Care about them. Just like adults, children want to know you care. They want to know you’re interested in what they have to say. You might think this is silly because your children should know this, but when we get busy, we send a different message. If we ‘practice’ listening to our children, we’ll be more effective with our friends and co-workers.

Power struggles happen because children want to feel significant. They want to know that they matter–just like adults. If we take the time to spend ten quality minutes (or more) with our children every day and listen to them, we’ll nip the bad behavior on the front end of our day and conflict will lessen.

When my children were little, I was known as “Queen of a Hectic Schedule.” I kept super busy, but never felt like I accomplished anything.

What about you?

I was often in a hurry, driving the kids to activities, the library, the grocery store. I drove a mini van and the kids would ride along in the back seat. I was never tolerant of erratic drivers, or those who took forever to turn, or those who drove below the speed limit.

I’d say, “Come on, Buddy.” Or “Move it, Buddy!” And once in a while I’d say, “What a jerk!”

Then one day my five-year-old son, Ryan, was playing in the living room with two toy trucks. He slammed one into the other and said, “Move over, Jerk!”

That stopped me cold.

Children do what children see. Was I portraying the image of the person I wanted my child to see? If there was a video-recorder filming my life, my influence on my children, would I be proud of what that would look like?

Probably not.

I used to think that if I read enough parenting books I’d figure out how to be the most effective parent, but that wasn’t enough. When our son grew up to be a teenager he said, “You don’t even know how to parent. You have to read all those books to teach you how!”

He doesn’t remember saying that, and he has children of his own now, but I’ll never forget the feeling that I had no control over my children. I didn’t understand what I was lacking.

That is, until I started studying leadership. John Maxwell says, “Leadership is influence. Nothing more. Nothing less.”

I was leading my children in the game of LIFE and I had no road map. I didn’t understand how important self-leading was in raising my children. Since they do what they see, I needed to improve my skills.

How well you lead as a parent will determine how successful your children will be.

Some people are born with gifted leadership skills, but some aren’t. If your child is typically a follower, don’t despair. You can teach him or her how to increase their effectiveness by raising your awareness. Leadership skills can be learned!

The first place to start on this journey is with yourself.

Questions to ask yourself:

What kind of leader are you now? Study leadership growth and reassess this in a month. Grade yourself.

What could you improve on? Time management? Prioritizing? Accountability? Focusing?

What kind of person do you want your child to grow up to be? Are you that person? What are you lacking?

Where are you spending most of your money for your children? Is it on food, clothing, extracurricular activities? Is it for their college fund? What about increasing your budget for yourself? To make leadership growth a priority?

Track your time. How much time are you spending with your children? Yes, they’re home with you, but how “present” are you in their lives? What are the actual minutes you spend developing them, showing them what’s important in life?

If this is something you want to do, then stick around. We’ll help lead the way to a better awareness. We’ll give you examples and study the principles of leadership.

Make LEADERSHIP an INTENTIONAL priority in your life. The best way to lead your child is to LEAD YOURSELF first.

This weekend I went to see Zootopia with Patrick, my four-year-old grandson. We laughed, jumped, and screamed at the scary parts. I love when a movie can entertain both children and adults because the writer was gifted enough to include multiple levels and layers in the plot that appeal to different ages. The movie is a true work of art. Each person’s take-away will be different depending on where they are in their lives.

This is the summary of the movie from IMDb:

“From the largest elephant to the smallest shrew, the city of Zootopia is a mammal metropolis where various animals live and thrive. When Judy Hopps becomes the first rabbit to join the police force, she quickly learns how tough it is to enforce the law. Determined to prove herself, Judy jumps at the opportunity to solve a mysterious case. Unfortunately, that means working with Nick Wilde, a wily fox who makes her job even harder.” Written by Jwelch5742

Here is one of my favorite quotes from the movie:

“I thought this city would be a perfect place where everyone got along and anyone could be anything. Turns out, life’s a little bit more complicated than a slogan on a bumper sticker. Real life is messy. We all have limitations. We all make mistakes. Which means, hey, glass half full, we all have a lot in common. And the more we try to understand one another, the more exceptional each of us will be. But we have to try. So no matter what kind of person you are, I implore you: Try. Try to make the world a better place. Look inside yourself and recognize that change starts with you.”

Isn’t that a great lesson for children?

Zootopia isn’t much different than America in that both have people with self-limiting beliefs. Limiting beliefs are thoughts which hold us back from believing in ourselves and by believing them, we never reach our potential. Some people have limited beliefs about rights, gender, abilities, and permissions. These attitudes limit us.

As parents, here are a few questions you can ask your child about this movie (or life) that will challenge them to learn about self-limiting beliefs and dreams:

If you could have any job in the world what would that be? The point here is to squelch any self-limiting beliefs, to find the root cause of something that happened to them to make them believe they could never have that job. (However, I’m not talking about a profession that requires a talent or skill like a pro basketball player. There are some jobs that require more than determination. If your child isn’t athletic and will only grow to 5′ 6″ it’s highly unlikely that he/she will grow to be a pro ball player.)

In Zootopia, Judy Hopps want to be a police officer, but her parents tell her she can never be one, that no bunny in their family has ever been successful in that profession. No one believes in her, yet she rises to the challenge. Discuss with your child a time when they did something or wanted to do something that they didn’t know they were good at until they tried.

Do you believe that most people are automatically good at something, or do you think they have to work at it for a long time to get good?

Tell me of a time when you started something new and you weren’t successful, but years (or months or weeks) later, you’re better. (Piano, soccer, typing, etc.) Learning is a process. Growth doesn’t happen in a day. It happens daily.

Look for patterns in your child’s answers. If you see the following patterns in their self-limiting beliefs, discuss and find examples that support otherwise.

Fear of rejection, change, and the unknown.

Blaming others or their circumstances as to why they can’t succeed.

Excuses –Irrational or untrue thoughts about why they can’t succeed.

Sacrifice — There is too much to give up in order to achieve.

Talent — Success is only 10% talent and 90% hard work.

“Shoot for the Moon. Even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars.” – Brian Littrell